Missing 'Asteroids' champ found dead in California

(IDG) -- The world record holder for Atari's classic arcade game "Asteroids" was located by game record keeper Walter Day of Twin Galaxies after nearly 20 years of searching. Unfortunately, the "Asteroids" champion, Scott Safran of Cherry Hill, New Jersey, died in 1989 after falling off a roof during an attempt to save his pet cat.

Safran set the "Asteroids" record of 41,336,440 points at a 1982 charity event, in a marathon playing session spanning nearly an entire day. Twin Galaxies, which has been keeping track of feats of video-game mastery since 1981, had been trying to find him ever since, in order to send him a certificate of merit. Twin Galaxies head Walter Day's quest ended in disappointment last week, however, as Safran's sister Marci Billow revealed that Scott fell off his California apartment's rooftop in 1989 while trying to round up his cat Samson. The fate of his cat is unknown.

In lieu of presenting the Twin Galaxies reward to Safran, Day will instead give the certificate to his surviving sisters. "Scott's surviving relatives are very pleased that he is receiving this posthumous honor," Bellow was quoted as saying. "We'll probably take turns displaying the award certificate that Twin Galaxies is creating to honor his achievement." And so the heroes of arcades past fade away.